Photo courtesy of: OctanBearcat, DeviantArt2012 has begun with a crack of lightning for me. And by that I mean, it hit out of the blue, knocked me sideways, and I'm still trying to put out the fire in my hair.
I released two books on January 3rd: IMMORTAL HOPE (dark paranormal romance through TOR) and STRIPPED (erotic romantic suspense through Berkley Heat). For the first time in my publishing career, my future sales now depend on current sales, and that directly translated to I couldn't sit on my hands and simply focus on the next book. I had to put myself out there. Promote. Figure out how to promote.
I settled on a couple blog tours (dates available on my blogsite) and have been struggling to keep up with everything. Writing guest posts (over 50), doing interviews (10 or so), and trying to track give aways, not all of which I initiated, but were prompted by my publishing house, but I still need to make an appearance when they occur. Add in that I am in edits for the second Curse of the Templars book, the second Black Opal book, and the fourth Inherited Damnation book, plus I have four novellas due back to back through April, and chaos is my middle name.
Which means... my life is best stated as See the Cartoon Above.
I'm normally pretty organized when it comes to writing. My usual desk is fairly clean, with only the current project's notes stacked off to one side for easy reference. I have a couple post-its tacked right in front of my keyboard, a pen haphazardly tossed about, and probably the previous day's coffee cup waiting. But otherwise, save for a little cat drool from 18yr old writing companion, we're clean, tidy, and efficient. Everything else is filed in file cabinets or transposed to my hard drive so the paper can be tossed away.
HAH!
I wish that were true right now, as I look at the mail from last week on the opposite side of my table, the pile of books I have to sign and get in the mail, the stack of notes about stuff I'm pretty sure isn't current any more, and a good week's worth of candy wrappers cluttering the minimal space where my laptop fits. Oh and did I mention? At night I'm writing by the light of the Christmas tree.
What am I going to do to better organize? Pray for this month to whirr by in another couple days.
Then, I will probably take down the tree first, and organize my house once more. We started with the demidemons' playroom today. Holy cow that was frightening. But I can't really focus when I'm sidetracked by so many other messes. I'll write a paragraph or two, then notice the pile of dishes and have to get up to fix that before I can continue.
So first up, clean the house. Put the darn Christmas stuff back in the shed. Then file all this accumulated junk, and sit down to outline the next three novellas in Inherited Damnation.
I say that, and it gives me hope. In truth, I have a sneaking suspicion, the majority of the first part of 2012 is going to resemble Murphy's Law of Clutter.
We'll see when I come back on the 30th and the blog tours are over.
But speaking of! Do come and join me, please. Between the two tours I still have 50.00 in Amazon Gift Cards to award, and there's plenty of opportunity to win.
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7 comments:
Hi Claire,
Wow are you busy. I don't think I could cope with that kind of workload.
Cheers
Margaret
Busy, busy, busy little bee. All good. Good luck with your releases! May be hectic, but enjoy!
Give yourself a round of applause, Claire! You wouldn't have such an organizational problem if you weren't on the road to success! I can only hope for your clutter in the near future. BTW, my Christmas Snow Village houses are still up, so don't feel too alone. LOL
Claire! My chest is tight just reading about your blog tour. 50! Plus all you've got to do. This is where you could use an assitant to collect your blogs and make sure they get to where they need to go, then to remind you when and where to show up. It would definitely be worth the money, IMHO. Well, somehow you'll make it through this and hopefully will see a nice bump in your sales.
Good luck! I'm rooting for you.
Claire, I'm very impressed. You seem to have struck the balance between writing and promoting. I think you should hire a housekeeper!
I nearly collapsed on my blog tour and I was doing it from the comfort of my recliner, laptop in place. I don't look forward to doing it again. Much luck to you. And major congrats on all the books. Too cool.
Thank you everyone! One of these days I'll get caught up. Today I managed to turn OFF the Christmas tree :)
I even debated taking down the stockings. "Later" won.
And Karen -- omg! I'd kill for a housekeeper.
Lynne -- I'd also love an assistant. But this isn't the time in the career to find one. Sigh.
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